Major cleanup of Imperial River's fallen trees, flood debris begins in Bonita

Fallen trees and other debris in the Imperial River will be removed in the coming weeks, according to the South Florida Water Management District.

A barge is planned to travel between Old 41 Road and Matheson Drive while an onboard crew and backhoe remove any major river blockages. The water management district is funding and operating the cleanup.

“This is almost an emergency project,” district spokesman Randy Smith said in an interview last week. “Had Hurricane Irma not come through, all of these trees and debris wouldn’t be in the river.”

The cleanup is set to operate through the holidays until the second week of January, Smith said.

“It’s a big project,” he said. “A lot of trees were pushed in there.”

The downed trees are causing an increased risk of flooding, Smith said, forcing the cleaning operation.

“The trees will have a major impact,” he said. “The trees act like a dam and impede the free flow of water that leads to flooding. It’d be catastrophic to have a major storm with all of the trees and stuff in the river.”

While clearing the Imperial River of major obstacles will help diminish future flood risk, it is not the catch-all solution to stop water problems in Bonita Springs, said Phil Flood, intergovernmental and outreach representative for the South Florida Water Management District.

More: Bonita Springs flooding solutions debated by City Council

“I don’t think it was just downed trees in the river that might have prolonged the flooding, but it certainly contributed,” Flood said. “Anything we can do to eliminate that flooding and, particularly, the duration of the flooding.”

Crews will only focus on the one section for now, although there are plans to clear the river from Interstate 75 to Bonita Grande Drive in January, the district said. Oak Creek also is expected to be cleaned.

“We think it would be worth doing some hydrology studies to determine if it needs to be dredged,” Flood said. “There might be pieces of the river out there that might have obstructions out there.”

More: Dikes, berms not answer to flooding in Bonita Springs

River cleanup is just one flood deterrent that the Water Management District is working on, Flood said. Engineers are investigating how to divert water away from the Imperial River entirely, he said.

“The first thing is to figure out how much water we can move down to the Cocohatchee River, so that’ll be key,” he said. “Then we have to look at what sources we can pull that water in from. But of course, we’ll keep that on the table and look at the possibility of putting a culvert under Bonita Beach Road.”

The Bonita Springs City Council hired Jim Beever, environmental planner for the Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council, to bring forward possible projects to mitigate flooding in the future.

More: Bonita Springs expects about $16.8 million in Hurricane Irma costs

The council has said it intends to receive state funding to implement some solutions. Bonita Springs city officials have made requests to the Florida Legislature for help.